Groundspeak Lifetime Membership

[+WRASTRO]

Life memberships are almost always a poor financial model for a viable business. Sell the consumer a life membership and start praying for them to die or to lose interest in your product. Great model to sell to potential advertisers. Continuing cash flow is what counts here. Annual memberships provide that.

[+Volvo Man]

Life memberships are almost always a poor financial model for a viable business. Sell the consumer a life membership and start praying for them to die or to lose interest in your product. Great model to sell to potential advertisers. Continuing cash flow is what counts here. Annual memberships provide that.

 

I'm gonna have to disagree with you here, Lifetime memberships are a fantastic way for a company to raise revenue and help themselves grow, but they have to be setup carefully, and the revenue raised managed appropriately.

 

Most lifetime memberships are setup based n a 10 year model, that is, 10 times the expected annual revenue from a subscriber. as a PM hasn't changed in price for a very long time, and probably won't, given the rapid growth in membership coupled with cost per member reductions presented by economies of scale, That gives us a starting price of $300.

 

If that $300 is invested in high growth long term safe investments such as FDIC insured CDs, its going to return annual interest sufficient to at least cover the annual costs per member. If the yield is more than the cost per member, this excess can either be taken annually to boost profits or left invested to yield higher returns in successive years. This also leaves a nice little sum in the bank for emergencies, and negates the need for a separate contingency fund (to some extent)

 

Now, lifetime memberships also have to be sold in a controlled way, if everybody takes the lifetime option, revenue will be huge for one year, then drop to a trickle, plus whatever return on investments you might get. Whilst this in theory means that if invested as mentioned above, the company would have a secure and solid revenue, in practice it tends to breed complacency and stagnation in growth and development. Flat profits, even if they are high, will inevitably result in senior management boredom and can lead to rapid collapse of a business.

 

So, any lifetime membership program must have limits, this can be a set number allowed per year (up to a max of 10% of subscribers is a good figure) on a first come first served basis. Or it could be on a length of membership basis, perhaps over 5 years as a PM for instance. I can even be done as a draw, but this would more than likely result in allegations of fixing from those who don't win, and would lead to some losses of existing customers (not a good idea).

 

A lifetime membership option can even drive continuous growth in annual membership sales, as it gives new subscribers the opportunity to sample the benefits of lifetime membership, along with something to aspire to if they find they like it. A simple example of this concept is the monthly option. Arguably, GS should get more benefit from monthly memberships (12x3=$36) than annually, assuming they have negotiated a good per transaction deal with the bank, but this means revenue trickles in, making forecasting and investment in growth tricky. So, they give us a discount to get our money now instead of over the next 12 months. I'll also bet that monthly subscriptions have a tendency to falter around December/January time.

 

GS have a good advantage in the lifetime membership stakes compared to many other companies as their offering is centralized and virtual. A lifetime membership that gives a regular printed newsletter or magazine or such means that the costs per member will remain forever and will likely go up over time (postage & paper), even if the member has lost interest. The cost impact of GC's premium members is data queries and Bandwidth, if a member loses interest, bandwidth costs stop within a week and server time within a week of whenever they do an untick the PQ after its been run clear out. They are also likely to go down in the future as bandwidth/dollar and processor power/dollar

go up.

 

$300 is a good price if GC decided to do LMs without increasing what you get from your membership, ie 5PQs and 6000 API refreshes per day. However it is a little on the low side. $500 would be a good figure (around the price of a top end GPSr) but this would need to include some added benefits to attract customers such as increasing to 20 PQs per day with unlimited API refreshes. Also something exclusive should be thrown in, perhaps a piece of software to automate PQ grid management & definition submission without using the website (a bit like eBay Turbo Lister).

 

Advertising supported free software with a paid ad free option uses exactly this business model, a popular piece of software that is heavily used probably attracts more revenue from the push ads than paid downloads, but the paid downloads are secure and not dependent upon use.

 

A similar concept is the lifetime warranty. I'm sure long ago someone told Snap-On tools they were crazy to offer a lifetime warranty on their tools because once someone buys a tool, they never have to buy another one (of that type). Well, they're still the market leader after 92 years, with an annual revenue of $2.9 billion! Why? because there's always someone new to the trade to buy and grow their tool kit, and nothing grows brand loyalty like replacing a damaged wrench that's over 40 years old for free.

 

So my vote goes thus:

 

I'd pay $300 for lifetime membership at the current (but matching the future) PM benefits.

 

I'd pay $500 for increased access LM if it was as I've listed above or better

 

I'd pay $750 for an LM if it had Unlimited PQs & API access, plus unlimited whatever else comes along in the future.

 

Incidentally, the unlimited $750 option would probably decrease somewhat the load on the servers, as I'd just run a full query of my PQ area the day before I go caching instead of having to do so continuously because it takes over 2 weeks to run the full set once.

[+OZ2CPU]

when my PM runs out, I always wait for as long as I can before I pay again, and get my 12month of new PQ,

so what is the point ?

it takes a few sec to pay, it is super easy

you can pay every 14 month, and then use your old PQ files for 2 month,

plenty of caches in them, if you plan them well and make alot of them for all sorts of areas you goto.

[+Volvo Man]

when my PM runs out, I always wait for as long as I can before I pay again, and get my 12month of new PQ,

so what is the point ?

it takes a few sec to pay, it is super easy

you can pay every 14 month, and then use your old PQ files for 2 month,

plenty of caches in them, if you plan them well and make alot of them for all sorts of areas you goto.

The Point is "Supporting the Site" & the "Geocaching Community"

 

And yes, its real easy to do what you're doing, it'd be just as easy to buy 10 single month memberships and raid as much data as you can in a month, then just use API status checking to keep your offline DB "fresh-ish" for the next however long you want, then lather rinse repeat.

 

But is it "Right" - that's for you to decide.

 

For context, I happily do some things using my internet connection that certain "Industry Associations" would really rather I did not. But I am still more than happy to have 3 PM subscriptions renew annually here. Why? the active word is "Community"

[+OZ2CPU]

>Why? the active word is "Community"

 

you think your money go to a broad number of persons needed to work for free, if you did not pay ?

or you think the money go mostly to a very little number of people working very little,

this is where I think it go, sorry..

[+Snoogans]

Didn't read the thread, so this may have been said.

 

I would gladly pay $300 or less, but I wouldn't consider much over that. Most cachers don't cache for 10 years. Only a small percentage of folks would get the full value of a lifetime membership at $300 and above.

[+bflentje]

Don't platinum members have a lifetime subscription.?

 

It'd be a miracle if this ridiculous notion of a platinum membership ever died. Thanks for railroading another topic.

That is the typical non platinum member respeonse

 

Wow, timely response.

[+bflentje]

Didn't read the thread, so this may have been said.

 

I would gladly pay $300 or less, but I wouldn't consider much over that. Most cachers don't cache for 10 years. Only a small percentage of folks would get the full value of a lifetime membership at $300 and above.

 

I plan to stop geocaching at 10 years or 10,000 finds, whichever comes last.

[+Gustav129]

I would NOT pay a lifetime membership for geocaching.

 

I currently have a lifetime membership to the NRA, and contemplating uping to lifetime for Ducks Unlimited and Pheasants forever.

 

Those organizations actually have a benefit (land purchases for conservation, 2nd ammendment issues, and such) that I and everybody else benefits from for the rest of my life, plus the next generations.

 

I wouldn't pay a "lifetime" membership for a hobby which wouldn't benefit others.

[+JesandTodd]

when my PM runs out, I always wait for as long as I can before I pay again, and get my 12month of new PQ,

so what is the point ?

it takes a few sec to pay, it is super easy

you can pay every 14 month, and then use your old PQ files for 2 month,

plenty of caches in them, if you plan them well and make alot of them for all sorts of areas you goto.

 

Cheap. I don't even care what you're talking about. That kind of post reflects people's behavior...and is cheap. And quite honestly nothing to be proud of...

 

...

or you think the money go mostly to a very little number of people working very little,

this is where I think it go, sorry..

 

You've got a severe lack of clarity/foresight/knowledge/common sense (you choose) if you think this of GS and all the products and services that they offer.

 

Wow...

[+Chrysalides]

when my PM runs out, I always wait for as long as I can before I pay again, and get my 12month of new PQ,

so what is the point ?

it takes a few sec to pay, it is super easy

you can pay every 14 month, and then use your old PQ files for 2 month,

plenty of caches in them, if you plan them well and make alot of them for all sorts of areas you goto.

 

Cheap. I don't even care what you're talking about. That kind of post reflects people's behavior...and is cheap. And quite honestly nothing to be proud of...

Rude. This kind of post reflects your lack of manners... and is rude. And quite honestly nothing to be proud of...

[+JesandTodd]

Manners? On an Internet forum? Lol....

[+Chrysalides]

Manners? On an Internet forum? Lol....

Time for a refresher?

 

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?app=forums&module=extras&section=boardrules

[+baloo&bd]

you think your money go to a broad number of persons needed to work for free, if you did not pay ?

or you think the money go mostly to a very little number of people working very little,

this is where I think it go, sorry..

 

Actually, I think the point is that your comment that people working for Groundspeak get over paid by saying "the money go mostly to a very little number of people working very little" is suite offensive and inappropriate. This site takes a lot more to run than apparently you have knowledge of.

 

How would you feel if someone on a public forum said you were lazy and not worth much?

[+Volvo Man]

>Why? the active word is "Community"

 

you think your money go to a broad number of persons needed to work for free, if you did not pay ?

or you think the money go mostly to a very little number of people working very little,

this is where I think it go, sorry..

 

I think if nobody paid, the site would quickly vanish, or at the very least become unusably bogged down by popup adverts and the like.

 

Not supporting GC.com means not supporting the geocaching community as a whole. You should have worked this out at any of the 12 events you've attended. (which would not have been publicised for free without GC)

 

I know where the money goes, it's not cheap to buy & run the equipment that GC are using to keep this site as fast as it is. and yes, it's probably only keeping a handful of people employed, and yes, I'm pretty sure there is a nice profit every year for those in the top echelon to enjoy. That's what ensures that they have an incentive to keep running and improving the site.

 

This isn't overpriced CDs or DVDs we're talking about here, where only pennies go to the originating talent and the rest goes to fat cats like Simon Cowell.

 

The nearest analogy I can think of is we're subscribing to a high quality free-to-post listing service that makes our hobby simple to get into and simple to do. If you want to see what could happen if there was no subscribers try craigslist and imagine you were trying to find a geocache on it from over 1.5 million others.

[+OZ2CPU]

I find it very funny, you think GS is a friend of yours, and not a company who work for money,

they got a product and get paied to sell it to you.

 

ANY company got a CEO, he gets paied more than any others working under him,

check out how many people work for GS and how nice and big their office buldings are,

you think they find gold in the celler ?

or someone pay them money ?

 

I dont complain about it, just face simple reality..

 

I pay, I get a product, it works, it makes me happy

it is that simple.

 

wierd people dislike me for informing them how all large companies are driven.

wake up, any time you purchase a product, someone ern money, and it is perfectly ok and normal.

Edited June 20, 2012 by OZ2CPU

[+Chrysalides]

Thomas, I think you may have been reading too much of what passes for news these days originating from the United States, and how they paint CEOs.

[+Volvo Man]

OZ2CPU, I think you need a taste of what things were like before anyone was paying for this service (which was provided by Jeremy)

 

Step Into My Time Machine

[Sandy]

Everybody is reminded to adhere to the forum guidelines, please. Some posts in this thread are bumping up against it.

Thank you.